Community Folk Art Center

Join us in celebrating the incredible creativity of the next generation of artists at the 54th Annual Teenage Competitive Art Exhibition Awards Ceremony, presented by The Syracuse (NY) Chapter of The Links, Incorporated in collaboration with the Community Folk Art Center! 🎨✨ Come experience inspiring artwork from talented teenage artists across the region on Thursday, June 11th from 10:00 AM – 12:30 PM at the Community Folk Art Center Gallery. Guests will enjoy a showcase of outstanding visual art and awards recognizing excellence in categories such as drawing, painting, mixed media, 3D art, and special honors including Best in Show, Director’s Choice, and more. This event is free and open to the public we look forward to celebrating these young creatives with you! Teens in grades 9-12 can submit their artwork Here: /jfe/form/SV_4MduRm6gZa735tA (Must be submitted by Friday, May 22nd)

Join us for African Liberation Day 2026 on Saturday, May 23, at 2:00 PM at the Community Folk Art Center. Hosted by GPAM, PACCNY, and the Africa Initiative Student Organization of Syracuse University. - This year’s theme, “Haiti & Cuba: Defending Pan-African Unity Against Imperialism,” will bring together community members, students, organizers, artists, and educators for an afternoon of political education, cultural reflection, solidarity, and collective engagement. This event is free and open to all; refreshments will be provided. Register at https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/8BuxZaPWQ-yrXwqrK7FX0g

Congratulations to our graduating student staff! And to the entire graduating class of 2026! 🎓🍊 Your continued creativity, dedication and care have made lasting impact on our center. From supporting Creative Arts Academy students to co-organizing events, your contributions have been deeply valued. We are proud of all that you’ve accomplished and excited for all that lies ahead. No matter where your journey takes you, you will always be part of the CFAC family.

Come move with us! Don’t miss out on Vibe & Flow every Tuesday at 6:30 PM 🎶 Move to the rhythm of Soca, Reggae, Afrobeats, Hip-Hop & more! 🗓️ May 12th, 19th, 26th & June 2nd 🌞Classes are just $10, no dance experience needed Sign up today on Eventbrite

It's A Safe Space 🙏🏾💙 #Spokenword #Poetry #PoetryCommunity #Poem #PoetryLovers

Check out the newest episode of the short film series, Black Arts Speak, with @dr._monconjae featuring the visionary artist Amber Robles-Gordon @amberroblesgordon and filmed by @blackcubproductions This episode arrives on the heels of her powerful retrospective exhibition, Healing Forward: Rituals of Self-Repair, Cultivation of Community, and Collective Activation, which recently closed on April 30th at the Community Folk Art Center. 🎥 Watch the full episode and engage with Amber’s journey. This video is a compilation of segments from Amber Robles-Gordon’s artist talk, interview with curator Tanisha Jackson and her commissioned Talking Stick Project Workshop, March 22, 2026 at the Community Folk Art Center. #BlackArtsSpeak #CFAC #HealingForward #BlackArt #ArtAsHealing

Spring in Harmony🎤🎸🎶 SUNY Upstate Medical University Student ensemble, Music As Healing filled the Blackbox Theatre with soulful tunes and joyful melodies last Friday at their spring showcase.

Today is the last day of my retrospective exhibition Healing Forward: Rituals of Self-Repair, Cultivation of Community, and Collective Activation. As part of installing this exhibition we worked with art installers/preparators and student workers. As the various student workers transitioned in and out during install week, I asked them questions about their lives, families, interests and educational goals. They asked questions about my life, artwork and the overall art industry. From the very beginning student worker, Manning Harper, made it her business to learn and assist. She was invested to cfac and this new experience. One the third day of install I started the last and impromptu installation. As I began to arrange the objects I intended to use I briefly explained to Harper the works were from five different series and how I wanted them to potentially relate to each other in this installation. Because the installation would be featured in the entrance of to the entire building my goal was to welcome the ancestors into this space. The 20 plus year practicing artist, art professor, curator wants so badly to explain all of the five series/bodies of works and share the intricacies of our interaction to further contextualize how I prompted and encouraged Harper to form this installation. But this is Instagram. And I’ll keep it simple. placed my artwork Ancestral Realms, My Blossoms and the Dominions Within in the center. Placed the slates by artist Wesley Clark underneath it. And proposed to her that we use other talking sticks on both sides of it. After placing these elements to visually give the installation at foundation. I asked her to consider how and where to place the embroidery hoops that represent the movements and cycles of the sun, moon and water. I walked her through the two most important tenets of how I build and formulate installations —visual or asymmetrical balance and charting and experience or concept…and referenced other points throughout the other installations in the exhibit. (Some of which she assisted with prior.)

Last week’s Power the Future: Hip-Hop x STEM Cypher Syracuse Edition was transformative . It was a day full of networking, giveaways, intergenerational dialogue, workshops, community, connection, and a fireside chat with the hip-hop legend MC Lyte @mclyte . Deep deep gratitude to all in attendance and all who made this experience possible! Powered by: MC Lyte (@mclyte ) Hip-Hop Education Center (@hiphopeducationcenter ) National Grid Foundation (@nationalgrid ) Martha Díaz (@iammarthadiaz ) Community Folk Art Center (@cfacsyracuse ) Good Life Youth Foundation (@gly.foundation ) (@djmaestronyc ) On The One (@ontheonellc )

Yo, tú, Nosotros, creamos naciones, a través del amor, la verdad y la reflexión ( I , you, we create nations. Through love, truth, and reflections.). 🇵🇷 #usvirginislands Healing Forward: Rituals of Self-Repair, Cultivation of Community, and Collective Activation Retrospective by Amber Robles-Gordon Healing Forward: Rituals of Self-Repair, Cultivation of Community, and Collective Activation. is a retrospective exhibition that traces the throughline of healing—personal, communal, spiritual, and ecological—across the artistic career of Amber Robles-Gordon. Bringing together installations, quilts, assemblages, and collages created over more than a decade, the exhibition reveals how healing has functioned not only as a thematic concern, but as a methodology and ethical framework within the artist’s practice. Robles-Gordon’s work has long been rooted in self-awareness, reflection, and repair—of the self, of collective memory, and of the environments we inhabit. Drawing from Afro-Caribbean spiritual traditions, decolonial histories, feminist thought, and ecological consciousness, her artworks operate as sites of reckoning and renewal. They ask viewers to confront inherited systems of harm while offering space for breath, ritual, protection, and transformation. The exhibition is organized into three interrelated sections, each articulating a distinct yet overlapping mode of healing and awareness. As a focal aspect of this exhibition Robles-Gordon creates installations that build upon history, personal and ancestral memory and Afro-futurism to establish bird and totemic like data transference structures. Her installation formula is grounded in visual and/or asymmetrical balance. Each installation centralizes the idea of a bird. Artworks are arranged in pairs. One for the left side and its pair on the right side to create the wings. Ultimately, manifesting transference mechanisms in an asymmetrical arrayment of aesthetic and didactic messaging. Curator @dr_tanisha_jackson @cfacsyracuse Exhibition February 9 -April 30, 2026

The Community Folk Art Center came alive with creativity, rhythm, and innovation during the Power the Future : Hip-Hop x STEM Cypher. This impactful event reminded us that art and music are more than expression they are powerful tools for learning, connection, and transformation. Through hip-hop, participants explored science, technology, engineering, and math in ways that felt relevant, accessible, and rooted in culture. Cultural centers like the Community Folk Art Center play a vital role in nurturing creativity, preserving heritage, and providing safe spaces where young people and families can see themselves reflected in the arts and in innovation. A special thank you to MC Lyte @mclyte hip-hop pioneer, for coming to Syracuse to share her wisdom, experience, and inspiration with our community. Her presence affirmed the importance of mentorship, leadership, and uplifting the next generation and to National Grid Foundation, Hip-Hop Education Center, The Good Life Foundation, and On the One for making this cypher an inspiring celebration of culture, knowledge, and possibility. The energy in the room was undeniable, and this is only the beginning. ✨ #HipHopEd #STEM #CommunityArts #YouthEmpowerment #PowerTheFuture